Note: Thanks to my beta t_geyer for her unending patience, perseverance and support.

SECTION 7 - LAKE OF FIRE

People cry, people moan.
Look for a dry place to call their home.
Try to find some place to rest their bones.
While the Angels and the Devils try to make THEM their own.

(Nirvana, Album - MTV Unplugged with thanks to Zanthinegirl for the suggestion)




Chapter 7.18
Friday, July 19th, 2002


The clean up seemed to take far longer than the battle. They saw to their injured and with a slightly lesser sense of urgency to the injured on the other side. Quentin tried to put his foot down, and though he managed to organise a couple of squads of watchers to carry away the unconscious citizens of Sunnydale to the minibuses and begin the task of dumping them far enough away that they could make their own way back but not so close that they might do it before the morning, no one who had already been given a task to do by either Giles or Spike seemed inclined to change what they were doing.

They found only seven dead amongst all the unconscious bodies. When Spike had finally dealt with those of his girls requiring emergency treatment, he traced his way back to where he had begun the battle, not sure how he would feel if he found Wood to be one of the dead, but when he got there and spoke to the watchers who had been clearing that area, he found that the man had disappeared in the chaos of the fight. This might have concerned the vampire, if he didn't have other far more weighty matters to consider. Buffy still hadn't called, The First might have plans for another attack and he needed to get the potentials back to base so that they could have a hope of getting some sleep before tomorrow's attack, which meant he needed to organise a guard from the watchers. In theory, assuming their plan actually worked, the potentials would be responsible for the bloodiest of the fighting the next day. The watchers, who would be taking supporting positions, didn't need to be quite so rested. The girls would probably lie awake anyway, but even that would leave them better prepared for the morning than more guard duty.

The vampire made his way toward the point where he had last seen Giles, the watcher taking charge of the bodies of the fallen, laying them out respectfully in the corridor that led to the basement entrance. It seemed callous, but when they opened up the seal tomorrow, the bodies would be going in. The general destruction would hopefully mean that any investigation into the deaths, if the bodies ever appeared on this plane, would be inconclusive. The last thing they needed was for events tonight to become part of a series of murder trials. He had just leapt through one of the vacant windows, taking a shortcut through the shell of the building, when he felt it. Magic began to tingle through his fingers, his hands... He closed his eyes and focused with all his might on Buffy and the tingling grew stronger, overwhelming his whole body. He sank to his knees, waiting for the sensation to pass. From there he toppled to one side and rolled until he was lying on his back on the bare concrete. He gasped for breath like a fish out of water until, finally, the sensation receded enough to allow him to laugh, laughter born of his mate's euphoria and the knowledge that their plan was falling into place. Half a dozen of his girls found him there, drawn by his familiar tone. Spike knew what it was like to be hugged by a slayer. This was the first time he'd been mobbed by six at once.

---

 

The day had been a long one, the time since Buffy had last seen Spike a comparative eternity to the way they had been living in each other's pockets since they had all moved into the school. Her whole body still fizzed with the magic, like sherbet on her tongue but all over. She felt like she had the power to do anything and all she really wanted to do was to share it with him. There was no conscious thought. She didn't reason out where she might find him or use her phone to call and find out where he was. She was simply drawn to him like iron filings to a magnet and as soon as she ensured that Tara and Lydia would be escorted back to the school by Wes and the other watchers, she left the others to deal with the clean up.

When she reached the top of the steps leading from the pyramid, Faith was just snapping shut her phone.

"Heading over to the high school," the dark haired slayer announced. "You?"

Buffy oriented herself, checking her personal lodestone against the familiar terrain. "Guess so... Think you can keep up?" she asked as she broke into a run, vaulting or leaping the headstones that got in her way as she took the most direct line to the construction site.

Faith didn't let her make too much of her slight head start and soon the girls ran shoulder to shoulder, not really racing but running just because they could, for the sheer joy of the adrenaline high and burning muscles and because they could no more have stayed at a walking pace right then than they could have sat through one of Giles' explanations without fidgeting.

They cleared the high cemetery wall with an ease that would have made Hong Kong wire-artists jealous and began threading their way through the deserted streets and back alleys of the town, the flat terrain allowing Faith to push them both a gear higher. "So I guess that was kind of like condensed essence of slayer going through us?" she laughed as she stretched her stride a little further.

Buffy actually broke into a laugh before she replied. "So I'm not the only one with an appetite?"

"Hungry 'n' horny?" Faith risked a sideways glance at her companion, who seemed more at home in her own skin than she had ever seen her. "Hell yeah!" she howled into the night sky. "And if your guy has Scottie on guard duty when we get there then he'll just have to go AWOL."

---

 

The first figure they saw as they approached the school was the last one they wanted to see. "Votes for running right on by and skipping the lectures until tomorrow night? Or I suppose tonight... technically," Faith suggested as they emerged from an alleyway and spotted Quentin Travers between them and the half-complete structure of the new high school, accompanied by one of the watcher middle management.

Quentin pointed in the direction of Miss Chalmers' School for Gifted Girls and then indicated one of the alleyways which led down to a larger street, which in turn curved around to meet the road on which the school was situated. His companion, to judge by the pointing he was doing, appeared to favour a different route.

"If we get killed in the battle we might miss out on it altogether," Faith suggested cheerfully.

"Rehearsal dinner? I'm expecting you and mini-Giles to be there. No dying before then... But, yeah, I think we-. Damn!" Buffy began an all out sprint, giving up on the idea of avoiding Travers as his companion slumped to the ground, clutching his abdomen. The scarecrow figure behind him pulled his screwdriver-dagger free and moved toward Travers.

---

 

News had spread rapidly through the school. There had been several girls who had been sent back injured from the construction site, and others, younger, had woken from their beds as they felt the change. They had obviously done it right, though, and none of the youngest had been affected. There wouldn't be any five year old slayers beating up their parents because they wouldn't let them stay up late.

Bee still thought of the new slayers as girls, but they weren't. They couldn't be. She had asked about that when Buffy and Faith had laid out the situation and they had been clear about it. The spell had been designed to empower only women of the slayer line. Even if some were as young as nine or ten, their personalities were already mostly formed, and extra strength or not, those who had been judged too young to take part in the training were going to have to wait for the next apocalypse before they got to lend a hand.

Bee dangled a slender white gold chain from the tips of her fingers, a cubic cut diamond, perhaps a third of an inch on each side, swinging from it by one corner. She realised that the time was almost here. She lit several more candles before lying back on her mattress again and watching the multicoloured sparkles of light that refracted through the diamond's flawless centre and played over the walls of the attic room as she waited.

Tara almost stumbled through the door when she arrived back, her features still glowing metaphorically if not physically from the after-effects of the ritual. She seemed surprised to find her roommate still awake and she checked slightly before stooping to stroke Rupert, who uncurled from his spot at Bee's feet to brush in between Tara's legs. "You didn't have to wait up."

"I wanted to... I mean who could sleep, anyway... but I wanted to be awake when you got back." For once she seemed to stumble over her words.

"Is that..." Tara's eyes fixed on the pendant, though she seemed to feel it rather than simply see it.

Bee replied with a barely perceptible nod.

"I thought you would have given that to Giles by now so that he could pass it on to..."

Bee sighed, swung her feet out from below her blankets and sat up, allowing Tara a proper view of her black satin pyjamas. "There was never going to be any passing on. I arranged to have it made... on the condition that I would be the one to wear it when the time came."

"But you-."

"I have the best chance."

Tara's face seemed to lose all of its previous animation, her eyes sad. "I-."

"I have the best chance, but if... well, if anything happens, take care of Rupert. He likes you and he's not just your average cat." Her eyes welled up, but she sped on as she could see Tara opening her mouth to interrupt. "It's okay. I'm really okay with it... If it wasn't for the fact that I was going to play the big dumb hero tomorrow I'd have to wait years to do this." She let the pendant drop back onto her cot and rose to her feet with a stately elegance. As she stepped closer to the witch, her skin seemed somehow bathed in silvery light. She reached out with a patient hand toward Tara's face, but the Wiccan didn't recoil from her touch.

When the demi-angel cupped her chin, Tara allowed herself to be drawn farther into the room before Bee pressed scarlet lips to her quivering mouth. She tasted of bright winter mornings and smelled faintly of honeysuckle. She felt tiny in Tara's arms, smaller by far even than Willow had been, but there was a strength to her frame that somehow prevented Tara from feeling as if she might crush her or suffocate her despite the relative difference in their sizes. Her mouth opened against the bright lips, responding shyly to their unfamiliar taste and touch. Neither of them seemed to feel the need to deepen the caress and no other part of their bodies met except where Bee's hand now cradled her cheek. After long seconds a slight creaking noise prompted them to pull apart.

A dark brown tail curled around the still ajar door as Rupert left them alone in the room, but once it was gone they had eyes for no one but each other. This time Tara knew the move had to be hers. Without taking her gaze from the eyes of silver-flecked hazel that seemed to be staring straight into her soul, she backed away until she pressed against the door and it finally clicked shut. There was a shimmer of relief in Bee's eyes and she knew that this was the right thing. Whatever the morning might bring, they needed each other tonight. Tara's fingers unfastened the buttons of her blouse as she walked back toward Bee, letting it slide from her shoulders at the last second to reveal the white embroidered cotton of her bra and the full swell of her breasts.

"We don't-," Bee began but Tara's fingers reached up to still her lips.

"I'm not doing anything I don't want to," she told the older woman. She could have said that she still felt pain at Willow's loss but that she knew the witch belonged in her past. She could have said that she hoped she and Bee would both survive the upcoming battle and that they would have the chance to see where fate might take them. She could have said that she had been tempted when Bee had held her when she had cried in the night to turn around and initiate a less platonic embrace. She could have said a million things but none of them were necessary and instead she lowered her head and began another kiss, one that didn't for long remain as chaste as their previous one.